Mma Tsbago directed her to a house on the edge of the village. It was a well-kept place, slightly larger than its immediate neighbours, and had been painted in the style of the traditional Botswana house, in reds and browns and with a bold, diamond pattern etched out in white. The yard was well-swept, which suggested that the woman of the house, who would also have painted it, was conscientious with her reed broom. Houses, and their decoration, were the responsibility of the woman, and this woman had evidently had the old skills passed down to her.

They waited at the gate while Mma Tsbago called out for permission to enter. It was rude to go up the path without first calling, and even ruder to go into a building uninvited.

“Ko, Ko!” called out Mma Tsbago. “Mma Potsane, I am here to see you!”

There was no response, and Mma Tsbago repeated her call. Again no answer came, and then the door of the house suddenly opened and a small, rotund woman, dressed in a long skirt and high-collared white blouse, came out and peered in their direction.

“Who is that?” she called out, shading her eyes with a hand. “Who are you? I cannot see you.”

“Mma Tsbago. You know me. I am here with a stranger.”

The householder laughed. “I thought it might be somebody else, and I quickly got dressed up. But I need not have bothered!”

She gestured for them to enter and they walked across to meet her.

“I cannot see very well these days,” explained Mma Potsane. “My eyes are getting worse and worse. That is why I didn’t know who you were.”

They shook hands, exchanging formal greetings. Then Mma Potsane gestured across to a bench which stood in the shade of the large tree beside her house. They could sit there, she explained, because the house was too dark inside.

Mma Tsbago explained why they were there and Mma Potsane listened intently. Her eyes appeared to be irritating her, and from time to time she wiped at them with the sleeve of her blouse. As Mma Tsbago spoke, she nodded encouragement.

“Yes,” she said. “We lived out there. My husband worked there. We both worked there. We hoped that we would be able to make some money with our crops and for a while it worked. Then …” She broke off, shrugging despondently.

“Things went wrong?” asked Mma Ramotswe. “Drought?”

Mma Potsane sighed. “There was a drought, yes. But there’s always a drought, isn’t there? No, it was just that people lost faith in the idea. There were good people living there, but they went away.”

“The white man from Namibia? The German one?” asked Mma Ramotswe.

“Yes, that one. He was a good man, but he went away. Then there were other people, Batswana, who decided that they had had enough. They went too.”

“And an American?” pressed Mma Ramotswe. “There was an American boy?”

Mma Potsane rubbed at her eyes. “That boy vanished. He disappeared one night. They had the police out here and they searched and searched. His mother came too, many times. She brought a Mosarwa tracker with her, a tiny little man, like a dog with his nose to the ground. He had a very fat bottom, like all those Basarwa have.”